


A cinematic masterpiece

by zombiegardener



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Fluff, I should be working, M/M, i hate today, tumblr is my downfall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-23 01:52:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8309239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombiegardener/pseuds/zombiegardener
Summary: Keith falls asleep on the couch with Lance during movie night after a long battle.  It's a bit of a surprise for (mostly) everyone else.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So last night I was flipping through tumblr and there were all these pics of Lance and Keith snuggling on the couch and I got this. And today sucked so I wrote it. It hasn't been proofread much because I really do have to work.
> 
> Spoiler alert: Altean cinema is not a cinematic masterpiece.

They’d won the battle. That should have been a cause for celebration and even one of the parades Lance was always advocating if the victory hadn’t been the result of almost 40 hours with no sleep and nonstop stress and things looking dicey a good bit of that time. The prisoners- hell, a whole planet- had been freed, which was more than they were aiming for when they set out yesterday morning. Even Allura thought the mission was a success.

Now, however, they were all straddling the line between the walking dead and being too wired on adrenaline to fall immediately to sleep no matter how desperately they needed it. There had been one too many close calls, although by some miracle not only were they victorious but no one was ending the day in a cryopod, which Shiro was taking as a personal victory. Bruises and pain he could handle, but every time he saw one of his teammates unconscious in the pods the guilt and recrimination became so thick he couldn’t understand how he was still breathing.

That was a problem for another day, though, because tonight they were all fine and awake, more or less. Because no one really wanted to be alone, they’d decided to meet in their commandeered rec room and watch what Coran assured them was the “epitome of Altean drama.” Shiro figured they’d all be asleep within 20 minutes. 

He dropped into an empty chair with a sigh as strained muscles made themselves known and glanced around at his teammates. Hunk was crashed on one of the couches, watching Coran with half-lidded eyes and a bare minimum of exhausted curiosity as the older man loaded the video into some sort of player that seemed to be rising out of the console monitor itself. Pidge was slumped next to him with her laptop, too busy downloading the intel they’d lifted from one of the Galra ships to pay anyone else any mind. Lance was sprawled across the remaining couch, already asleep with one arm thrown over his eyes to block out the light, because of course he was. One of the first things Shiro had learned was that Lance could sleep literally anywhere. He claimed it was because he’d learned how to fall asleep no matter what was happening with a large family in a too small house, but Shiro privately suspected he was more like a kid’s toy that ran nonstop and then collapsed when the battery ran out. Regardless, right now he envied him the ability because his eyes were so tired they were on fire and whatever Coran was so excited about was probably going to melt what was left of his functioning brain cells based on past experience.

His gloomy introspection about the upcoming “movie”- it was almost impossible to face any video of any sort that Coran was excited about without the use of mental air quotes- was interrupted as the door opened and Keith walked in. The younger man looked exhausted, hair still wet from a shower and one hand rubbing at his arm where Shiro knew he’d taken a bad hit earlier. His pale skin was nearly translucent with exhaustion and did nothing to hide the dark circles under his eyes. Shiro was kind of surprised he was upright. Keith hesitated and glanced around the room at the apparent lack of seating, his gaze finally stopping on Lance with an expression Shiro couldn’t quite decipher. 

Hunk glanced away from Coran with a slightly dazed expression and noticed Keith. He smiled slightly at his sleeping best friend. “Hey, Keith. No worries, man, I’ll wake his ass up.”

Keith shook his head like he hadn’t realized that that he’d been staring and glanced at Hunk. “What? No, that’s okay. I’m used to it.”

Hunk frowned but obviously decided to let that go, writing the odd comment off as a product of a lack of sleep. Coran finally finished fiddling with the monitor and began an excited and way too perky monologue about the “cinematic masterpiece” or something to that effect. Honestly, Shiro wasn’t really listening, because Altean “cinema” never made any sense. Coran was bouncing and tugging on his mustache, which didn’t bode well for anyone. Finally, Coran settled down in his chair and dimmed the lights, almost vibrating in anticipation. Shiro glanced at Hunk and rolled his eyes and was about to settle back and try to enjoy himself when he saw Keith kick his shoes off out of the corner of his eye. He looked over as the other boy knelt down, nudged Lance, and whispered, “Hey, scoot over.” His voice was surprisingly gentle.

Lance opened his eyes and blinked sleepily up at Keith but did what he asked, moving to the back of the couch and half sitting up. Shiro held his breath and waited for the inevitable argument to start about Lance hogging an entire couch, but Keith just dropped down next to him. Lance blinked down at him, still obviously barely awake, before scooting down a bit farther, shoving back against the cushions and curling up against Keith with his head on his chest. One hand was resting against Keith’s neck, his fingertips just barely curled into Keith’s damp hair. He muttered something Shiro couldn’t hear as his eyes slid back closed, and Keith smiled, wrapped one arm Lance’s shoulders, and whispered something back. One hand might have even started playing with Lance’s hair, but honestly Shiro had already reached the conclusion that he was in a healing pod, because what the hell? 

He glanced at Hunk but found no help there. Hunk was sitting up straighter and staring at the pair on the couch with something between concern and glee. Hunk nudged Pidge, who flashed him an irritated scowl without really tearing her attention away from her computer, and then glanced at Shiro. Shiro gestured at the couch with the hand that was mostly hidden from Keith’s line of sight and mouthed “what the hell?” Hunk just shrugged and shook his head.

They stared at each other for another minute before Shiro decided he was too tired to care and probably hallucinating. He could deal with this tomorrow. Or never. Never might be a better option. Turning towards the monitor, he tried to lose himself in whatever the Alteans considered programming in the hopes that he could just fall asleep before his brain shorted out.

Twenty minutes later he was forced to admit defeat, because what the Alteans considered a cinematic masterpiece obviously didn’t align with the experiences of Earthlings. Despite his effort to pay attention, the weird montages and fading effects and the almost shockingly casual violence imposed with something that might have been some sort of morality message had him both more tired and more wired than he’d been when they started. There may also have been a two-headed sloth-thing eating something he wasn’t going to think about for way longer than was strictly necessary, but that may have been delirium starting to kick in. His new goal in life was to get close enough to Earth to hack Netflix and download _everything_.

Rubbing his eyes with his human hand, he glanced back around the room. Coran was avidly watching the “movie”, apparently oblivious to everything else that was happening. Pidge was still on her laptop, ignoring everyone with a focus that was almost inhuman, and Shiro made a mental note to make sure that she made it to bed tonight before she collapsed. Keith and Lance were still doing whatever they were doing. Keith had somehow managed to fall asleep, which was impressive because he’d been at least looking in the direction of the monitor the last time Shiro had glanced at them and the movie wasn’t exactly conducive to sleep. The position also didn’t look random, he decided, but like they’d fallen asleep together on the couch before and had worked out how to fit in the narrow space. It was actually kind of sweet, in an entirely unexpected sort of way.

Hunk was looking back at the couch, a fond smile on his face. Shiro decided he couldn’t let it go anymore, because this was so much more interesting than the movie and he deserved entertainment, damn it. “So, Hunk.” Hunk jumped and cast a quick glance at Coran before jerking his attention back to Shiro. Shiro felt his lips twitch as he tried not to laugh, because Hunk looked almost guilty. “Did I miss something?”

“Um.” Hunk cleared his throat, looked away, and looked back again. “Yes. Maybe? Honestly, I have no idea.” He glanced back at the couch and frowned. “Okay, yes, I think, but I’m not sure what because Lance sucks at keeping secrets and this one is news to me.”

That was true. Still, Hunk’s expression was morphing from fond to confused to vaguely hurt and Shiro thought he should do something. “Maybe it’s not what it looks like?”

They both stared some more, but the two boys on the couch refused to look like they were doing anything but cuddling. “Okay, no. Maybe we should have checked Keith for a concussion. His eyes were looking kind of glazed.” 

“Well, he was mostly upright.” Hunk shook his head. “Maybe they’re awake and messing with us.”

Shiro squinted in their direction and leaned over the arm of the chair. “Keith.” Hunk snorted a laugh that he just managed to cover with his hand when Coran made a shushing gesture. “KEITH.” The stage whisper was loud enough to get a glare. 

His only response was a sleepy but somehow still irritated sound from Keith, who turned his head away and wrapped the hand that wasn’t on Lance’s head around the other boy’s bicep. Lance shifted in response to tangle one of his legs between Keith’s and snuggle closer. It was adorable. He kind of wished he had a camera. Hunk must have had the same thought, because they turned to Pidge in unison.

When Pidge continued to ignore them, Hunk poked her in the arm. She finally glanced up in irritation. “What?”

“Do you have your phone?”

“What? Yes, of course I have my phone. Why- Oh.” The sentence cut off as she followed the direction of Hunk and Shiro’s gazes. “Oh my god, that’s blackmail material for all eternity.”

Hunk let out a low cackle and tossed Shiro the phone because he had a better angle. Shiro smiled and snapped a picture with a low flash. Neither one of them even twitched, so definitely not awake.

He tossed the phone back to Hunk, who held it over Pidge’s head. “You totally owe me 20 bucks.”

Pidge snorted and stood to retrieve the phone. “Hunk, I don’t HAVE 20 bucks. And what would you do with it anyway?”

“Have it framed. It could say ‘the day Pidge was absolutely wrong and Hunk was right.’ Or something. I’d have to think it through.”

Coran finally looked around to see what they were up to. One hand was back on the mustache. “What are you lot going on about back there? This is the good bit! It reminds me of my boyhood when the wurtzels would come into season.” 

Shiro shot him an apologetic smile. “Sorry Coran. We’ll keep it down.”

“Okay, but what’s the fuss over Lance and Keith? They sleep together almost every night. Why wouldn’t they sleep together here?”

Shiro was pretty sure that his expression matched the incredulity on Hunk’s and Pidge’s faces as Coran turned back to the "movie". 

Pidge blinked at them in confusion and lowered her voice. “We wouldn’t miss that, right? It’s not like either of them are subtle.”

Hunk frowned, eyes distant. “Seriously? Lance hits on everything and everyone and never shuts up about it and NOW he suddenly decides keeping secrets from me is an option? We’re so having a talk tomorrow morning.”

Shiro felt a slight headache coming on and wondered how distracted he’d been recently to miss this, because Pidge was right. Keith and Lance weren’t exactly subtle about anything. Ever. True, the past couple of weeks had been a constant barrage of missions and defensive fighting and planning with very little time to sleep or train or unwind. He could barely remember the last time he and Keith had actually talked, which was something he was going to remedy tomorrow morning first thing no matter what happened. And then he was going to have that picture framed and show it to them every time they started an argument, because that was gold right there.

***

  
Keith woke up to the feeling of Lance shifting next to him and made a sleepy sound of protest. The room was dark and quiet, and all he wanted was to drift back to sleep with Lance safe and here in his arms and possibly never get out of bed again.

It was the word bed that stopped him and set off silent alarm bells. Blinking his eyes open he stared up a ceiling that was much too far away to be the alcove around one of their beds.

“Hey.” Lance’s voice was full of sleepy amusement. Keith could just make out his soft smile looking down on him in the darkness of the room, which meant it was late. Or early. Most importantly, definitely not time to get up yet, which meant they should go back to sleep. Here. In the rec room.

“Hey,” he answered back, ignoring the quiet panic that was slowly building because he honestly wasn’t sure how Lance was going to react to the fact that apparently he’d just outed their relationship in a sleep-deprived haze.

“Are we in the rec room?”

“Mm-hmm.” Lance still sounded amused, so Keith shot for nonchalance. 

“And when exactly did we end up like this?”

Keith groaned and tried to cover his face but Lance caught his hand with the ease of practice and held it down. “Um, maybe when I walked into the room?”

Lance stared at him for another second before dropping his head down on Keith’s chest. His shoulders were shaking slightly with what Keith hoped was silent laughter because he was never quite sure where Lance’s moods were going to go. He tried to clear the fog from his brain and decided to make a preemptive attempt at an explanation just in case. “I just… I was so tired and you were asleep on the couch and all I wanted to do was hold you and not think about people shooting at you, Lance!” His voice may have risen on the last couple of words because Lance looked back up in surprise.

“Babe, calm down. It’s okay. I’m not mad. I was just curious.” He rested his chin on Keith’s chest and flashed a tired smile. “Tomorrow’s going to be interesting.”

Keith sighed and let the babe comment go. “Maybe no one noticed.”

“Did you cover us with a blanket?”

“Um.” Keith glanced down and noted that, yes, someone had totally covered them with a blanket. “No.”

“Then they noticed.” He didn’t know what expression crossed his face but Lance suddenly laughed and leaned up to kiss him. “Chill, Keith. It’s probably more than time that we had this talk anyway. No secrets, remember?” Keith nodded and pulled Lance back down again, closing his eyes and inhaling the familiar scent of his shampoo and lotion as their lips slid together a little more firmly this time. He had just slid his hands up Lance’s back under his thin t shirt when Lance pulled away with a breathless laugh and sat up. “Yeah, we should probably go to bed, because falling asleep on the couch is one thing but this is something else altogether.”

Keith felt his cheeks go pink as the reality of where they were came crashing back. So far they’d been incredibly careful to not cross any lines, but right now all he wanted was Lance’s skin under his hands so he could catalogue his new bruises and cuts and reassure himself that his boyfriend was really okay and alive and breathing. So yeah, they should get up. He glanced back up at Lance’s face, which was backlit from the faint light emanating from the walls and only visible as lines from this angle, and pulled him back down.

In a minute. Maybe two.

**Author's Note:**

> I should post this on tumblr but I can't go back there because it's like a downward spiral, so I guess i"ll update this note when I do. That's motivation, right?


End file.
